Strangers
by Aro Holmes
Summary: A brilliant and eccentric philosophy professor meets a brilliant and somewhat unhinged heart surgeon at a hotel bar and an unlikely romance begins. Sherlock/Twilight cross-over AU with re-imagined Aro and Sherlock.


_Author's Note: In this AU, Aro is a modern-day human without special powers and Sherlock is a philosophy professor. _

_Warning: pervasive mature themes._

* * *

The hour was late enough that the hotel bar was empty except for a single bartender. Aro didn't particularly feel like a drink but the quiet solitude of the place, expensive and gleaming, appealed to him more than the claustrophobic solitude of his hotel room. It was his last night in Stockholm now that the conference had ended and he felt at loose ends. He had nothing to do for the next few hours but try to get some sleep before catching his flight back to London in the morning.

Aro choose a barstool and ordered a chaste orange juice. He sipped a little of the drink and looked meditatively across at his reflection in the mirrored surface behind the bar. The image looking back at him was paler than most, large expressive eyes framed by thick dark hair that fell past his shoulders and was pulled back neatly in a way that made him look interestingly archaic, regal even, an impression supported by his black three-piece suit, shirt and tie, all of which gleamed just a little as though carved out of obsidian. Aro was pleased with his carefully chosen appearance despite the circles under his eyes and his somber, downcast expression. It had been a long two days at his conference and he was tired, tired of other people, of talking to other people, of being friendly and amiable and charming and brilliant and confident, and all the other things he was known for within his professional community.

He was only partly aware of the man who had just entered the bar and was ordering a drink. No one he recognized from the conference participants. Aro gazed down at his glass and let his mind go blank, seeing only the orange color of the drink, pallid under the lights.

"Hello," said a deep, pleasant voice, and Aro looked up, startled, to see in the reflection in front of him that the newcomer, wine glass in hand, had taken the adjacent seat. The tone of the greeting assumed prior familiarity but Aro couldn't place the man at all among the conference participants he'd come in contact with or just seen in passing. In the mirror the stranger made a striking contrast to Aro, tall, slender build, loose dark curls, high cheekbones, and strange narrow blue eyes, a slim-fitting dark suit and white shirt, no tie. He looked upper-class but wore it easily, casually even.

It was the long-fingered hand holding the wine glass that Aro saw first when he turned his head, and then the man himself, slowly, as though it took a special effort to see him clearly and see him whole.

"Amazing conference wasn't it? _Fascinating_ subject."

Erring on the side of courtesy, Aro gave him a politely gracious smile, putting on a subdued version of the exuberant geniality he had displayed all weekend. "Yes. Quite a lot of innovative ideas under discussion, I wasn't expecting exactly that level of radical thinking."

"Is that so? I'll have to take your word for it as I wasn't actually in attendance."

"Oh?" Aro paused, a little taken aback. The man's attitude had shifted subtly, as though he had been playing a part a moment before. He was smirking at Aro now, a little too intimately.

"No, I'm staying at the hotel purely by coincidence. I didn't know there would be an epicenter of international medical brilliance going on here until I arrived. I wasn't aware you could get so many surgeons together without a global disaster being underway."

Aro's smile broadened a little, he was amused in spite of himself, and intrigued enough by the stranger to go on talking to him.

"Aro Volturi," he said, putting out his hand.

"Sherlock Holmes," replied the stranger, grasping his hand and looking unaccountably smug.

"How did you know I was here for the conference?"

"Just a guess really, I'm good at drawing conclusions from little giveaways."

"Are you a detective then?"

Sherlock chuckled. "Good lord no. Is that what you think I look like? You're not very good at reading people."

"I suppose not," said Aro evenly.

"Now you on the other hand, you're an open book to me," said Sherlock, running his eyes over Aro appraisingly. "Surgeon's hands, fine-tuned control, cardiothoracics most likely, a brilliant turn for cutting into people with minimal damage, not good at reading people but you observe and focus on details, meaning that you're used to appraising a situation, no fear so you're probably very good at it, probably very very good at it."

"You got all that just from looking at me?" Aro asked, not sure whether to be impressed or disturbed.

Sherlock smiled in a self-satisfied manner and drank his wine.

"Of course," said Aro, "you might have seen me with the hotel conference attendees, even heard my name and looked me up. The rest is just showmanship."

"You would know all about that," said Sherlock, speaking a little more rapidly but with the same clean precision, gesturing with his elegant hands. "You're good at manipulating people, know how to work a room or an audience, know how to finesse your colleagues and patients, calm them with a touch, dazzle them with a smile, turn them on with a word. All surgeons have a bit of a god complex, but you, you're rather extreme. You really enjoy getting your hands inside people, particularly with the knowledge that their thoughts and emotions are paralyzed by anesthetics while you dig around inside of them in all that blood, commanding their hearts to stop or start at your pleasure."

Aro sucked in his breath and stared back in amazement. He had to tamp down the almost irresistible urge to seize Sherlock's head in his hands and twist it off his shoulders.

"You're very strange," he said finally.

Sherlock smirked, if possible, even more smugly.

"So are you."

Aro looked away, unsure of how to reply to this. He took a drink instead, draining his glass.

"Let me buy you another, something stronger?"

Aro raised his hand to stop Sherlock from signaling the bartender.

"Thank you, but no, I'm fine."

"Sorry, I know I'm a bit off-putting once I get going," said Sherlock, without a touch of remorse.

"Do you find…I mean…does anyone ever react well to you just walking up and profiling them?" Aro asked.

"To be honest, no," said Sherlock. "Typically people just tell me to piss off."

Aro laughed, a high, naturally erratic sound that he had learned to more or less control over the years by softening it around the edges. Sherlock grinned, apparently taking it as a good sign.

"So, why are you in Stockholm exactly?" asked Aro. "If you're not a medical professional attending an international conference or a detective tormenting innocent people?"

"Oh I'm a guest lecturer at one of the universities here."

"You're an _academic_?"

"You make that sound very damning, but yes." Sherlock took his mobile out and pulled up a web page, holding the device out for Aro to read.

Sure enough, there he was. A guest lecturer in philosophy at one of Stockholm's finest universities with an impressive array of credentials after his name. A photo taken a few years ago judging from the shorter haircut and the even more slender build, but the same man.

"Very admirable," said Aro. "I was going to guess something more substantial as your focus, politics, banking perhaps, but philosophy, very nice." Aro hadn't meant for his tone to shift into sarcasm but he was definitely starting to feel antagonistic toward Sherlock. He was also becoming extremely attracted, which in turn angered Aro because he could not help suspecting that Sherlock had made this happen artificially for his own amusement. Perhaps Aro had looked like a suitable target for a practical joke, sitting alone at the bar like that.

"And you?" said Sherlock, mimicking Aro's tone with an arched eyebrow. "National Health Service instead of the private sector? Running a department instead of running a hospital? You're surprisingly modest in your ambitions."

"I'm not…," Aro began, and then caught himself. "You know, it's impressive that you can put this together out of nowhere but my life is actually none of your business."

"Oh certainly," said Sherlock, as though playing an enjoyable intellectual game. "You prefer to keep people out of your life. The more people have to rely on you the harder that is, otherwise you'd be building a kingdom for yourself, with as many recruits as you could get, instead of keeping a carefully managed cardiothoracics department as streamlined and under-staffed as possible. Also why you don't form relationships easily, there's no one who can get close enough to you. Even though you've got what is it? two? three adoring siblings? Which is how you end up using an empty bar for company because it's easier being alone in a public space than it is in a private space."

"Well," said Aro slowly, the desire to tear Sherlock's head off growing stronger, "This _has_ been fascinating, but I think the bar is closing now." He nodded in the direction of the bartender who was hovering nearby in a politely oblivious manner.

Sherlock leaned in a little and his face took on a darkly seductive expression, causing Aro to feel simultaneously light-headed and terrified.

"How about," said Sherlock, lowering his voice, "I order a bottle of this wine, it's really very good, and get a couple of glasses, and we continue our conversation up in my room?"

Up until this point, it hadn't occurred to Aro that Sherlock might actually be trying to chat him up. A vivid image of what Sherlock was hinting at, dimmed lights and bodies locked together in frantic movement under a hotel sheet, appeared involuntarily in Aro's mind and he mentally distanced himself from it. The last thing he wanted was an opportunistic bunk-up with a total stranger who was quite possibly nothing more than a charming sociopath with a taste for the unusual.

At the same time, Aro felt that he must have somehow gotten very cold and was now standing next to something very warm, so warm that he knew that if he reached his hand out towards Sherlock, the warmth would grow stronger the closer he got, until the heat began to burn him.

Aro smiled, a small polite smile usually deployed to soften the blow when he disagreed with a junior colleague.

"Sorry, I'd love to but I have to get some rest before tomorrow, I have a surgery scheduled as soon as I fly back."

"Sounds exhausting," said Sherlock lightly. But there was a look of genuine disappointment in his eyes that Aro couldn't help but find credible.

"Some other time," Aro said, irrationally not wanting to hurt him further even though he absolutely did not want to continue the acquaintanceship.

Sherlock brightened. "Give me your phone."

"Sorry?"

Sherlock was pulling out his own mobile and holding it out. "So I can give you my number. Here, you give me yours."

Aro fumbled a little as he typed his number into Sherlock's mobile, wondering what the hell he thought he was doing. Why did he always have to be so nice to everyone? Why couldn't he have just said, no thanks, not interested?

"Smile," Sherlock said, holding up his phone and snapping a picture of Aro before he could protest.

He examined the result with a critical eye. "Hm, no, you look like you just swallowed a bad oyster. Try again." He held up the phone and snapped rapidly, then squinted at it.

"I would have thought you'd be better at this, you're such a stickler for appearance. Ok, in this one you just look extremely judgmental. It's going to put me off calling you every time I try your number but so be it."

Aro decided to ignore the idea that Sherlock intended to call him multiple times. He stood and nodded politely to Sherlock, as though they had just had an interesting exchange at a party. "Goodnight then, have a pleasant stay in Stockholm."

"Safe journey," said Sherlock, his v-shaped grin going up rather than across his face, in the manner of a Victorian goblin.

Aro left the bar a little shakily, leaning back against the inside of the lift on his way up to his room and breathing a little too hard. What the hell had happened there? Who _was_ that?

* * *

It wasn't until Aro had been back home for several days that he allowed himself to remember Sherlock Holmes again. He had expected the memory to be faded now, like a bizarre fever dream that becomes harder to recall over time. Instead the whole thing came back vividly. Too vividly. Aro could almost smell Sherlock's scent, feel the solidity of his lean body through his slim-fitting shirt, run his fingers through his hair….

Aro came back to reality abruptly, his pulse racing and his breathing rapid. He was standing in his bedroom after a long day at work, frozen in the middle of unknotting his tie by the sudden attack of imagery. He hadn't meant to start thinking along these lines but now he had to face the fact that he had just become incredibly, painfully, irreversibly aroused.

He sighed in frustration, then did what had to be done, lying down on the bed and unfastening his trousers. Another vivid, unbidden image entered his mind as he began to stroke himself, an alternate memory of leaving the bar and getting into the lift, except this time Sherlock entered the lift after him, at the last moment just as the doors were closing, shoving him up against the hard surface of the wall…. In reality, Aro climaxed with unexpected violence, his spine arching and his head tilting back as he cried out.

Almost immediately afterward, he was filled with crushing regret. He hated touching himself. It always left him sunk in an extreme of despair and depression, far too aware of the fact that when it was over he was completely alone.

Aro lay miserably gazing up at the ceiling, wishing desperately that he had never gone into that bar and ordered a drink, had just gone up to his room, had never gone to the conference in the first place.

He groaned and turned his face to the pillow, wishing that at the very least he had never met Sherlock Holmes. Aro cursed silently, because just the mere thought of Sherlock leaning over and inviting him back to his room made him hard all over again.

Two hours later, Aro was staring at his reflection in the bathroom mirror and contemplating suicide with a dangerous level of sincerity.

His mobile rang and he picked it up. Unbelievably, the number on the screen was Sherlock. He hesitated a moment and then answered, forcing himself to sound normal.

"Hello."

Sherlock's voice was annoyingly cheerful. "Hello. I'm back in London now and I was wondering if we could have that drink tonight."

"I can't, sorry, I was just about to get some sleep."

"It's only 9:00."

"Well it's been a long day."

"I see…you're tired out from all the masturbating."

Aro winced. "Sherlock, do you think you could, just, not do this right now?"

"Sorry," said Sherlock, actually sounding contrite. There was a brief silence before he spoke again.

"But you _were_ thinking about me the whole time, yes?"

"Good night, Sherlock," Aro said firmly, and ended the call.

He was still staring at Sherlock's number a few minutes later, his thumb poised over the delete button, when the mobile rang again.

Aro answered it exasperatedly.

"What?"

"Have you deleted my number yet?"

Aro leaned against the sink a little shakily.

"I was just about to."

"I wish you wouldn't."

"Why? Why am I so fascinating?" Aro's voice rose a little.

"I think I might be in love with you."

Aro caught his breath and gripped the edge of the sink so hard he expected it to splinter.

"No scratch that," said Sherlock. "I absolutely definitely am in love with you. I've just never felt this way before so I'm still trying to get my head around it."

Aro couldn't speak and there was a longer silence this time.

"Are you still there?" asked Sherlock, a little timidly.

"Yes."

"Can I come over tonight?"

"No. Absolutely not."

"Then can I see you tomorrow night?"

Aro stared at his reflection again as if he had never seen himself before.

"Yes."

"Yes?" Sherlock sounded as though he might have just jumped up and down with glee.

"But it has to in be a public space. A restaurant."

"That will only mean more witnesses when you rip my head off."

"How did...?"

Sherlock laughed giddily. "You have very expressive fingers, Aro Volturi. I'll see you tomorrow night."

* * *

The restaurant Aro had chosen was small enough for an intimate dinner but populated enough that he felt at least a little reassured that the presence of on-lookers would keep Sherlock circumspect in what he said or did.

Sherlock had arrived before him and was already seated, gazing abstractedly at the carafe of water in the middle of the table. Aro was a few minutes late and it suddenly occurred to him as he threaded his way through the other tables that Sherlock might be starting to wonder if he wasn't going to show after all. This suspicion was confirmed by Sherlock looking up with an expression of surprise and relief when Aro reached their table and sat down.

"Surgery ran later than expected?" Sherlock said, examining Aro.

"Just a little," said Aro, making only fleeting eye contact. He picked up the menu and tried to turn the letters on the page into decipherable words. It was simply ridiculous that being in Sherlock's company could make him forget how to read.

Sherlock smiled, picking up his own menu. "Thought it would be a routine surgery did you? Too bad about the arterial bleed at the last moment. For a few minutes there you thought you'd lost her. But I'm glad to see she's recovering well."

Aro put his hand over his eyes. "Sherlock…."

"Yes?" Sherlock asked innocently.

Aro looked at him stonily for a long moment, then signaled the waiter instead.

During the main course Aro managed to steer Sherlock into neutral territory by getting him to talk about philosophy. Sherlock obliged, bringing in a range of fascinating topics on society, language, human behavior, and the changing understanding of time. Aro began to relax a little, and by the end of the meal, he was even enjoying himself.

They were sharing an order of sticky toffee pudding, Sherlock's choice, a favorite since childhood he said, when Sherlock looked at Aro with a serious expression, putting down his fork and pressing his palms together in front of his mouth.

"What?" asked Aro, still smiling over a joke from the moment before.

"There's something I don't understand about you," said Sherlock. "I'm usually complete in my deductions, but you're hiding something that I can't get at. It would be intriguing if it wasn't so damn frustrating."

Aro folded his hands, interlacing his fingers. They were both leaning their elbows on the table by this point, and the shared pose brought them closer together than they had been all evening.

"Have you considered that you might not actually want to know everything about me?" he asked.

"Never."

Aro was silent. His eyes fixed on a point just to the left of Sherlock's head.

"You know what I'm talking about," said Sherlock.

Aro looked down with a somber expression. It wasn't the first time someone had asked what was wrong with him, but it was the first time he had felt compelled to answer. Whatever hold Sherlock had developed over him seemed to be tearing down his defenses piece by piece.

"I'm a bit insane," he said quietly.

"You can't be insane if you think that. Insane people think they're perfectly sane."

"I think that might be a myth in popular culture, actually."

"How are you insane then?"

"I don't…I don't place any trust in what people say about their thoughts or how they express their emotions. Everything people say or do, I always assume they're faking it, putting on an act."

"You think everyone is lying to you?"

Aro sighed. "Not necessarily, maybe, yes. It's just that I don't _know_. Say I was blind and you told me the sun was yellow. I would have nothing to go on besides your word. You could be lying, the sun might actually be blue. Or you could be telling the truth. I simply don't know, I can't see the sun. I'm aware most people go through their lives without this bothering them. It just, bothers me too much I suppose."

Aro looked up, expecting to see Sherlock looking clinically fascinated by this strange revelation, but instead his expression was full of sympathy.

"I'm sorry. It must be hell on any kind of personal relationship."

Aro nodded silently, taking up his dessert fork and turning it over and over in his fingers.

"Also explains why you think someone earnestly chatting you up is a sociopath with no real interest in you."

Aro smiled a little, feeling the absurdity of it now. Then a thought occurred to him. "You don't have anyone close to you either, do you?"

"That's true," said Sherlock matter-of-factly. "But then I'm not really into people that much. I've always been considered married to my work. You're actually the first person I've ever wanted to get close to."

He picked up his fork and speared the last bite of pastry absent-mindedly, then offered it gallantly to Aro.

* * *

They ended up back at Aro's flat, Sherlock giving it an appraising once-over and then accurately opening the correct kitchen cabinet in search of glasses.

"I don't have any wine on hand," said Aro, opening another cabinet. "But I do have an impressive selection of Christmas presents from various colleagues over the years. Let's see, I have scotch, gin, novelty liqueur of some kind, vodka…."

"I have a confession to make," interrupted Sherlock.

Aro paused and turned warily to look at him.

"I, er, wasn't entirely honest when we first met."

"Oh?"

Sherlock looked a little embarrassed. "I didn't profile you when I saw you in the bar. I did it when you were checking into the hotel."

"On Friday? You were there?"

"I was reading in the lounge and I could see you at the front desk. I got everything at that point, well nearly everything. I didn't do anything creepy after that, like look you up online. I just followed you around for the weekend until I could get you alone."

Aro was speechless for a moment, trying to assimilate this new information and unable at the moment to determine whether he agreed with Sherlock's definition of not being creepy.

"Why didn't you say anything? I don't even remember seeing you."

"I can be very discrete when I want to be. And you were always talking to someone or other. I've never seen someone so popular. By the way, I snuck into your presentation on transplant surgery, it was very good."

"Close your eyes," ordered Aro.

"What?"

"Just close your eyes, and don't talk for a while."

Sherlock obeyed, clearly amused.

Aro came closer and reached out his hand, tentatively brushing Sherlock's face with his fingertips, along the contour of Sherlock's high cheekbone and down to cup the side of his face. Sherlock drew in his breath sharply but remained docile and still. Aro wished desperately that he could see below Sherlock's skin, into his mind, wished that his touch could give him that.

He lifted his head and gently kissed Sherlock's soft lips, his own fitting into them so effortlessly that they might as well have done this a thousand times. After a moment, Sherlock leaned in and deepened the kiss. The sound Aro made was closer to a sob than a moan but his hand slid around to grasp the back of Sherlock's head, tangling in the curls there.

After that, there was no restraint. Sherlock went for Aro in a frenzy, dipping and turning his head to get at him as they kissed, slipping his fingers into Aro's thick hair and gripping his head to pull him closer as Aro clung to him. The sensation of burning heat that Aro had felt from Sherlock on their first meeting rose up around him, blazing through his body until it engulfed his heart and turned his chest into an inferno.

* * *

Sherlock was not gentle. At first, Aro had to grit his teeth against the pain until his body adjusted to the intrusion. He could have stopped Sherlock, told him to go more slowly, but he wanted this more, wanted the unambiguity of Sherlock's desperate passion as his long body moved over Aro's, grinding him into the bed with heavy thrusts as he continued to kiss him with the same rough fervor, claiming his mouth, jaw, throat.

Gradually, Aro felt himself building towards his release. His arms, wrapped loosely around Sherlock's shoulders, tightened, and he pulled himself up to bury his face in the warm curve of Sherlock's neck.

Sherlock pushed him back down again onto the bed, his face set in earnest concentration, almost as if he were holding his breath. Aro looked up at him uncertainly, until Sherlock began to adjust his movements, and then he understood that Sherlock was still reading him, still getting inside his head. Sherlock's pace slowed while at the same time he pushed deeper. With each new thrust, Aro gasped, the sensations in his body growing steadily stronger, more intense, more varied. His gaze fixed on Sherlock, his lips parted, and then his climax took him and his eyes closed tightly, his fingers digging into Sherlock's back.

On the other side, there was Sherlock shuddering against him and crying out his name, kissing him breathlessly before he had even recovered.

There was silence for a while. Aro lay on his back with his dark hair pooling around him, his heartbeat thudding insistently in his chest, looking up at the ceiling with an expression akin to the aftermath of religious ecstasy. Sherlock lay wrapped around him, his fingers tracing slow patterns over Aro's body with a kind of tentative joy.

"I'm happiest when I think of you," Sherlock said at last.

Aro turned his head toward Sherlock, causing the tears welling up in his eyes to spill over, trails of heat crossing his face.

"You asked why I find you so fascinating," Sherlock said in explanation. "I'm happiest when I think of you. How could I not be fascinated by that?"

Aro smiled tiredly. A small, dazzlingly beautiful smile that lit up his face. Sherlock caught his breath, transfixed and captivated by this new discovery.

"I believe you," Aro said softly. And he was only a little surprised to discover that this was perfectly true.


End file.
